Knitting machine needle and jack



Nov. 25, 1947. A. CURRIER KNITTING MACHINE NEEDLE AND JACK Filed Aug. 15, 1944 2 4 MW 2 a 4 Patented Nov. 25, 1947 KNITTING MACHINE NEEDLE AND JACK Arthur Currier, Tilton, N. H., assignor to Acme Knitting Machine & Needle Company, Franklin, N. H., a corporation of New Hampshire Application August 15, 1944, Serial No. 549,507

1 Claim. 1

In some knitting machines, the needles are customarily mounted in jacks, each jack carrying a single needle. For this purpose it has been the common practice to make the jack with a slot in its upper end of such dimensions as to receive the butt of the needle loosely, and to solder said butt to the jack. This operation requires placing the needle properly in the jack so that the over-all length of the needle and jack, or at least the distance that the needle hook projects above the lug or lugs of the jack will be accurately predetermined, holding the parts so positioned while the solder is flowed into the slot and aroundthe needle butt, allowing the solder to set, and then dressing down the soldered joint with a file.

When the needle break or is worn out, the solder is melted out, the slot in the jack is cleaned up, and a new needle is mounted in it in the manner above described.

These operations require considerable time, labor and expense, and it is the object of the resent invention to devise a construction in which most of this time, labor and expense will be eliminated.

The nature of the invention will be readily understood from the following description when read in connection with the accompanying drawings. and the novel features will be particularly pointed out in the appended claim.

In the drawings,

Fig. 1 is a side elevation of a jack with a knitting machine needle mounted in it, portions of the jack being broken away, and the joint between the needle and the jack being made in accordance with this invention;

Fig. 2 is a side elevation on a larger scale of portions of the needle and jack shown in Fig. 1;

Fig. 3 is a view similar to Fig. 2, but illustrates the parts separated from each other; and

Fig. 4 is a vertical, sectional view on the line 4-4. Fi 3.

The construction shown in the drawings comprises a knitting machine needle 2 of a common form, except for the fact that the lower or butt end portion of the needle is provided on each edge with lateral projections or lugs 3-3. The jack 4 also is of a common construction except that it has a vertical slot 5 formed in its up er end and the walls of this slot have a shape, contour, or outline complemental to that of the opposite edges of the needle butt. Both the jack and the needle shaft. including the butt section, are usually made relatively thin, say in the neighborhood of a thirty-second of an inch in thickness, and they preferably are made of the same thickness so that when the needle is in its operative position on the jack both parts will fit snugly but slidably in the same slot of a needle a the purpose.

cylinder.

The cooperating portions of the needle and Jack when completed appear in side elevation substantially as shown in Fig. 3, and the needle is mounted in the jack simply by pressing its butt laterally into the slot 5. The parts can readily be made so that the lugs 3 fit snugly into the recesses provided in the walls of the slot to receive them, and these recesses are so positioned that when the needle is in the jack the hook at its upper end is in the desired spaced relationship to the cam engaging lug or lugs 6 on the jack.

Customarily the slot 5 is made by a punching operation. While the lugs 3 provided on the needle butt may be made in various ways, I prefer to produce them merely by bumping or striking the flat surface of the needle butt at the proper area to indent or groove the metal, as shown at a in Fig. 4, this deformation of the metal serving to produce a lateral flow of it in opposite directions sufiiciently to form the small projections or lugs 3-3. When four lugs are used, the two indenting o erations preferably are performed on o posite surfaces of the needle butt, as shown in Fig. 4.

The slot 5 is not exactly parallel with the edges of the jack, but is given a slight backward slant so that the surface of the needle in the region b, Fig. 1. at the back of the hook is in line with the left-hand edge 0 of the jack. While this result can also be accomplished by making the slot straight, or parallel with the edges of the jack. and bending the needle. the other construction is preferred since it avoids making a bend in the needle.

It will be evident from the foregoing that this invention completely eliminates the necessity for soldering the needles and jacks together; it makes the matter of mounting the needle properly in the jack simply one of pressing its butt portion into the slot of the jack laterally. and when it becomes necessary to remove the needle it can be pressed out. Usually this operation can be performed by hand. but if a tool is required for this purpose a pair of flat-jawed pliers will serve In needles of the more common sizes, these lugs or projections 3 need only extend a few thousandths of an inch beyond the adjacent edge portions of he needle butt. However, they do have shoulders at their opposite ends engaging cooperating shoulders at the ends 3 of the complemental recesses formed in the walls of the slot 5, so that when the needle and the jack are assembled, the shearing strength of the metal parts which must be relied upon to hold .4 other and one face of said butt having a groove pressed therein in line with one pair of said lugs and the opposite face being similarly grooved in line with the other pair, the lugs being formed them against relative movement lengthwise of 5 by the displacement of the metal from said the needle is ample to transmit those forces which grooved portions and the lugs being of substanoperate the needle. It will thus be appreciated tially the same thickness as the metal of the butt that this construction is far more "convenient ";taat? the bottoms: of the respectivegrooves. for the'mills to use than the prior art form rev quiring the soldering and unsoldering operations 10 AR HUR CU R ER- above described. It has been emonstrate'dnin actual practice that the construction provided REFERENCES CITED y this invention is e y Satisfactory in The following references are of record in the opewriiltioni h h h d m d i-Elfile of t'his =patent:

ie ave erein s own and: escr "e' I a. V, preferred embodiment of -my invention;- it is '15 UNITED STATES PATENTS contemplated that the inventi0n.may ,be ,em- 1 Number Name Date bodied in other forms without departing from 332,372 Adgate Dec. 15, 1885 the spirit or scope thereof. 763300 Hurley June 28, 1904 Having thus described my invention, what I 20 995,304 Swinglehurst June 13, 1911 te desirfi'to claimasrnew'is: fi 2,165,464 Eichner July 11, 1939 A: nitting machine-needle-having a-thin at a p H wrbutt portion-provided with -.two pairs of lugs-=exv FOREIGN PATENTS tending from opposite edges thereof, thelugs. of Number 'Country v Date eeach -pair being in transverse alignment with eaclg 25 23,626 Great Britain 1901 

